NPR.

This is the Antichyde from Planet Money, I'm Darian Boards.

And I'm Whale and Wong.

Crypto continues to be a roller coaster ride, with volatility in prices and companies filing

for bankruptcy.

It might seem like an unlikely place to invest someone's nest egg.

No, not the place for your pension fund and retirement fund.

But these companies that run these are dipping a toe into crypto.

This is caught the attention of government regulators and the government regulators are

saying they might investigate the 401k plans that offer crypto investments.

And this is not the first time there's been debate over whether retirement savings should

get mixed up with new risky kinds of investments.

50 years ago, a fledgling venture capital industry was trying to get going but had a big problem.

The government wouldn't let pension funds invest.

In fact, the venture capital industry might have gone extinct if it had not been for a change

in something called the Prudent Man Rule.

So who is this prudent man?

Who indeed?

Today on the show, we meet this person, we learn how he helped create modern venture capital,

and we ask, would the Prudent Man invest in crypto?

The 1960s were a boom time for private pension plans.

Workers signed up for them by the millions and by 1970, these pensions were holding over

...